Civilian Oversight Commission Loses Some Credibility With Vote on
Drone Program

By ALAN SKOBIN

(The writer is
an attorney who served as a Los Angeles police commissioner for nine years,
including multiple terms as vice president.)

Los Angeles
County Sheriff Jim McDonnell recently reaffirmed that it is his “responsibility
to ensure the safety of more than ten million residents, which includes using
whatever tools necessary and available that can save the life of a human
being.” McDonnell added that “I will not face the loved ones of a victim whose
life could have been saved by our ability to deploy” and “I cannot imagine
meeting with the spouse or parent of a fallen deputy and say, yes, we could
have done more.”

These salient
words from McDonnell were not made in the aftermath of horrific tragedies such
as the recent shooting in Las Vegas that resulted in at least 59 murders and
over 500 other shooting victims, the killing of 49 people and wounding of 58
others in a Florida club, the assassination of five police officers in Dallas,
or any one of many other unthinkable acts. Rather, they were in response to a
recent 5-4 vote by the Civilian Oversight Commission (COC) for the Los Angeles
County Sheriff’s Department that called for the sheriff to ground all drones
(also known as Unmanned Aircraft System or UAS) even though the Sheriff’s
Department has implemented strict written orders that limit the use of drones
to operations with extreme threats such as active shooter and hostage
situations, barricaded suspects, search and rescue operations, and hazardous
materials dangers.

These orders
also mandate that each instance when a drone will be deployed be subject to a
stringent approval process and procedures that regulate the operation, and also
contain a specific prohibition against the use of drones in random surveillance
missions or missions that would violate the privacy rights of the public.

After that vote,
Commission Chair Robert Bonner stated:

“Now we’ve lost
credibility with the sheriff…we shot ourselves in the foot.”

As a former
member and vice president of the Los Angeles Police Commission, the civilian
head of the Los Angeles Police Department that is responsible for setting all
policy and which played a pivotal role in guiding the LAPD through
implementation of a complex Federal Consent Decree, I concur with Bonner’s
observation and am dismayed at the vote, particularly given the stated reasons
and rhetoric that led up to it.

The COC is an
advisory body that was created by the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors
in 2016 to improve public transparency and accountability with respect to the
Sheriff’s Department. In January, 2017, after the Sheriff’s Department acquired
several drones, the Board of Supervisors asked the COC to evaluate the program
and make recommendations. It should have been expected that the review would
not only solicit and consider public input, but also that any subsequent vote
by the COC would be grounded in facts and sound policy. Sadly, that did not
happen in the latter.

The majority of
commission members seem to have placed little, if any, weight on the report of
their own ad-hoc committee which stated that drones “are capable of giving the
LASD situational awareness that would not otherwise be possible in certain
situations, and there is little doubt they will save lives in the future,” and
which contained 10 recommendations that addressed transparency, accountability
and public safety, all of which McDonnell had agreed to adopt. Instead, they
opted for off-base political rhetoric and voted to disregard the thoughtful
recommendations and instead discontinue use of drones for any purpose.

Further, while
expressing a belief that it is “unfortunate the Sheriff did not obtain public
comment before implementing the use of its UAS program,” the report of the
ad-hoc committee noted that “at the suggestion of the ad hoc committee, the
Sheriff recently set up mechanisms to directly receive comments from the
public,” adding:

“His
willingness, even now, to reach out, receive and evaluate public comment is
laudable” and that “Implementing these recommendations, in our view, will help
build public trust.”

Interestingly,
the recent online survey by the Sheriff’s Department resulted in an
overwhelming 89 percent of the more than 3,000 respondents supporting use of a
drone in certain high risk operations.

One commissioner
expressed her belief the drone program should be grounded, in part, because of
the “the very clear evidence of harm that the use of such drones can produce in
the most vulnerable communities.” In that same letter, the writer cited
concerns that have been raised about the militarization of law enforcement.
Public comment also included opinions such as “[t]he addition of Drones would
further signify the structural and operational formation of the LASD as an
occupying institution that operates as a counter-insurgency force,” “Drones are
globally associated with death and destruction. In people’s consciousness,
drones represent the murder of thousands of people including children,” and
concerns that use of drones will be subject to mission creep.

What the
commission majority didn’t appear to do in considering this public input was
properly balance it with information contained in the report of its own
sub-committee, such as the lifesaving benefits of the drones, and the specific
prohibition against their use in random surveillance missions or missions that
would violate the privacy rights of the public. They also didn’t compare facts
with fiction because the LASD drones are a mere 20-inches long and in no way
resemble the large multi-million dollar “Predator B” or “Global Hawk” drones
used by the military (which have wingspans of approximately 66 feet and 130
feet, and length of 36 feet and 47.6 feet, respectively), or give due regard to
an earlier report by the Office of the Inspector General that had five key
findings, including “There appear to be proper safeguards…to operate the UAS in
a responsible and safe manner keeping privacy rights in mind,” and the “Order
appears to be narrowly tailored to the public safety missions to prevent
imminent danger to life or serious damage to property, and does not allow for
the improper surveillance of the public.”

Somehow it just
didn’t matter to five of the commissioners that the drones are a tightly
regulated and controlled tool that save lives, and that the sheriff not only
agreed with the OIG findings, but agreed to implement the 5 separate OIG
recommendations, as well as the 10 recommendations of the CAC. Nothing seemed
to be enough for the naysayers, except truly nothing when it comes to drones.

The 5-4 vote
accepted the rhetoric despite the specific prohibition against their use in
random surveillance missions or missions that would violate the privacy rights
of the public, and gave weight to utterly unfounded charges, with one
commissioner actually announcing he was “thrilled” with the vote. Bonner
rightly predicted the sheriff was likely to reject the recommendation because
the drone is a “tool that will save the lives of deputies and…save the lives of
citizens in our community,” and the sheriff “cannot responsibly just say I’ll
ground these things.” Even beyond that, he appropriately pointed out that the
solution to ground the drones permanently “does not provide for oversight of
the limited use of a drone by the LASD, the very thing that the COC was
established to do.”

The nine
commissioners undoubtedly have different political perspectives and life
experiences, which is a healthy thing for any deliberative body, and their
efforts toward transparency are both important and commendable. But one
critical thing I and many of my colleagues recognized during our service as
police commissioners was that credibility with police leaders and rank and file
personnel was the key currency to acceptance and successful implementation of
both our informal recommendations and actual policy changes.

Much of this
credibility came from considering and balancing varied interests, and then
making decisions that were grounded in facts. The necessity for that
credibility is doubly true for entities such as the COC because unlike the
Police Commission, which is the actual head of the LAPD and has the legal
authority to establish policy, the COC is an advisory board and their
recommendations can be rejected by the sheriff.

As such, it is
critical that reason, not unfounded or political rhetoric, underlie their
decisions.

The discussion
and majority vote failed to meet this standard, and undermined the credibility
that is so important if the COC is to fulfill its important role to “promote
meaningful reform within the LASD and to help restore public trust between the
communities it serves.”

Certainly, no
one expects the COC commissioners to be cheer leaders, nor should they be. But
they are leaders, and the manner in which they undertake and deliberate
important issues, taking into account both public and professional input, will
have a profound effect on their ability to make a difference.

Hopefully this
misstep by a majority of the COC will not have damaged the ability of the COC
to persuade the sheriff, rank and file personnel, or the general public with
respect to the important work that they undertake.